As far as Cody Ford saw it the day after, Sunday's assignment in Cleveland consisting of coming off the bench cold to face NFL Defensive Player of the Year Myles Garrett isn't exactly new.
"We've got one just as good as he is," Ford said Monday, "and I see him every day."
That's a reference, of course, to Bengals Pro Bowl edge rusher Trey Hendrickson. With help from Ford and friends, Hendrickson now has the most sacks of any player in the NFL during the last two seasons when he was Sunday's biggest pass rusher of the day.
As Garrett was held to one pressure, according to Pro Football Focus, Hendrickson had another outrageous win rate of 38% that led to two more sacks. That gives him 24.5 sacks since the 2023 opener, one more than the Steelers' T.J. Watt, according to Pro Football Reference.
Hendrickson now has seven sacks on the season, two behind NFL leader Dexter Lawrence. Garrett has four this season, 18 over the last two years.
MORE FORD
Rewind to the second day of Bengals head coach Zac Taylor’s first draft in 2019. The Bengals, holding the 42nd pick in the second round, tried for much of the day with multiple teams to trade up and take Ford, coming out of Oklahoma as a guard-tackle. When the Bills took Ford No. 38, the Bengals traded out to 52 and took Washington tight end Drew Sample.
Both played huge roles for them on Sunday.
Ford, signed as a free agent before last season, helped keep Garrett at bay on 37 snaps, his high as a Bengal. Sample had the biggest block of the day on the biggest play when he sprung Charlie Jones for his 100-yard kick return that opened the game. Sample also helped out on Garrett during his 28 snaps on offense.
Ford started his Cincy career as primarily a guard with tackle versatility, but moved to primarily tackle with guard versatility this year. He's now the third tackle with Trent Brown out for the year.
When left tackle Orlando Brown Jr. went out with a calf injury early in Sunday's second quarter, Ford, in his 73rd NFL game, had it under control.
"When I practice, I take as many snaps on the left side as I do the right," said Ford, who filled in for Brown last season during the final 17 snaps of the win over Seattle. "It wasn't like I hadn't seen the left side in a long time."
Taylor says Brown's injury won't be for a long time, but Ford is ready for whatever.
"There's no need to go and create a whole new routine," Ford said. "Maybe just turning my mindset from being one play away to, OK, maybe I have to play the whole game. No one knows what's going to happen, so no need to create unknowns and hypotheticals."
What Taylor knows he has, particularly after Sunday, is roster gold: Reliable versatility.
"When he was coming out of OU, the way we looked at him, it was kind of guard-tackle conversation," Taylor said. "To see his career transpire in Buffalo and Arizona, he's done both of that. He's come here and done it all. Just whatever position you put him at, he just approaches it the right way and gives you belief that he can do the job. That's a good quality to have in a backup lineman. You've got to be versatile, and he's done that for us."
Taylor indicated that both Brown and safety Geno Stone (lower leg) would start the week questionable and would be back in the short term, but wouldn't say if they were day-to-day or week-to-week.
"I think (Stone will be) be obviously sore this week. He's got a pretty good contusion, but I like his chances," Taylor said. "And, Orlando will be questionable this week as we work through that one, but again, both those guys having to come out and miss the game, to see that it's going to be certainly more short-term is positive."
BACKS R US
Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins scored the touchdowns Sunday, and quarterback Joe Burrow played well enough to stay within 1.4 points of Jared Goff and the NFL passing lead.
But it was plays by running backs Chase Brown and Zack Moss that ignited the offense Sunday. Both players continue to give the coaches what they sketched out in the offseason. Brown is the speed back who is giving them the 20-plus runs they felt were missing, and Moss is the no-nonsense technician who executes the textbook.
"They're willing to help where we want them to help with the protection. They're available as the checkdowns," Taylor said. "They do a good job when we hand the ball to them. Two guys that are unselfish."
Moss did a lot more than run it Sunday while helping the effort to chip Garrett, as duly noted by offensive coordinator Dan Pitcher Monday.
"I thought he did an outstanding job in protection. And then the different elements of protection that he was involved in, it wasn't just picking up blitzes," Pitcher said. "It was being able to help on certain defenders and knowing when was the right time to do that, and how was the right time to execute that."
His offense held to 86 yards and no points in the first half, Chase Brown ripped off the first snap of the second half for 22 yards around the right edge. A play after that, Moss went 19 yards down the sideline on a check-down pass. Two plays after that, Burrow hit Chase for the back-breaking touchdown midway through the third quarter.
Brown used blocks from right tackle Amarius Mims and Higgins racing down the sideline.
"The plan all along was to just kind of vary the schematic attack in the run game. We felt like (the Browns were) not a group that you can just do one thing and that was a run that had a chance to hit around the edge," Pitcher said. "We got a good look for it into that call his speed showed up there."
Two snaps later, Moss split out from the backfield before the snap and said he believes Burrow saw Browns linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah collapse on Higgins and leave him alone in the flat.
"He was where he was supposed to be and credit to Joe Burrow for seeing him and being able to spit the ball accurately all the way to the sideline," Pitcher said. "The ball got completed wider than it normally gets completed and he threw a super accurate ball to Zack, who caught it and got what was there down the sideline."
But that's not the play Pitcher had in mind. He was thinking about the play in the first two minutes of the fourth quarter and the Bengals trying to kill the ball with a 15-point lead. Another checkdown, this one on third-and-two from their own 25, and Moss broke the tackles of JOK and safety Rodney McLeod to get the first down.
"He was able to shake free of two different defenders and extend the drive there to let us burn another two minutes off the clock in the fourth quarter," Pitcher said. "The first one was a little bit scheme. The second one was all him just making a play."
It's just what they drew up in the offseason when they signed Moss in free agency.
"He's a selfless guy. He does whatever we ask of him," Pitcher said. "And he definitely showed up. And when you get a two-score lead in the second half of football games, your running backs are going to become the focal point, and they've got to be able to produce."
FULL HOUSE
Call it an inverted wishbone. Call it whatever you want. Whatever it is, the Bengals have been putting two people in the backfield often enough to notice because Sample and rookie tight end Erick All Jr. are superb blockers.
Good enough they've been finding themselves at times dotting the I in front of Brown and Moss, something they rarely used to do. But that was before they drafted All in the fourth round this year.
(Note when Moss split out on his big checkdown, Sample stayed next to Burrow.)
"Creating angles, being able to create certain kickout blocks from unanticipated positions from a defensive perspective," Pitcher said of what seems to be a growing NFL trend. "If you can vary the looks and build it out so that within that look there's four or five different things they've got to be ready to defend, it's always going to be useful.
"You have to have the people who can do that. The people who can move and react and see, make good decisions, we feel like we have that in those tight ends. It helps limit the element of predictability. If we continue to do that, we'll be in good shape. "
